Rogue by Danielle Steel

Maxine is a well known Psychiatrist and an expert on childhood trauma & adolescent suicide it is her passion as well as her three children of whom she adores. Her marriage to the handsome entrepreneur Blake Williams was may have been something that most women would fawned over to Maxine it was just an adventure in her life. He had done well in providing for his family but his quest for never-ending fun as well as his work drew him away from his family for weeks at a time. He was not anywhere Maxine could find him when their youngest son Sam rolled off the changing table at eight months old and broke his arm and hit his head. Maxine had tried fervently for two days to find him finally catching up with him in Cabo he was on his way to Venice. He flew straight home when he got there she flew into his arms crying and told him she couldn’t do this anymore and wanted a divorce. He didn’t want to get a divorce, he asked her why didn’t she quit and fly around with him, and they could get more help. She said then she would never see her kids just like he didn’t now. Why didn’t he quit and stay at home with them more often, he said that he couldn’t imagine staying cooped up all the time. In the divorce settlement he gave her the apartment in New York, the house in Southampton and a gracious settlement that she turned down and took child support instead, also she had use of his yacht/sailboat once a year for one week a year for vacations. They still remained close friends; Blake still traveled all over the world and visits the children as often as he did when they were married. He buys houses, invests in risky business ventures and continues to have fun. While Maxine continues to grow her successful psychiatric practice and being invited to speak at conferences and be on panels and the like. While her daughter is having a sleep over of a few of her friends and her sons are over at their friends spending the night. She gets a call that one of her teen patients had tried to commit suicide a second time this time it was a very lethal dose of sleeping pills and he seemed more serious this time than he had last time. After she gets back from the hospital that night she checks on the girls and notices beer bottles in the closet. She sits them on the dresser so her daughter will know that she has found them. The next morning she goes into her daughters room and wakes them up Tells her daughter about it and that her friends should get dressed and leave and that she is on restriction for a month. When she returns back to the hospital to she Jason her patient that has tried to commit suicide, his mother is even more distraught and has talked to her doctor who said he would talk to Maxine to see if he could persuade her to let Jason come home instead of an institution. When Maxine received the phone call from Dr. West he acts like a royal pain concerning Jason and his condition just thinking he is trying to get attention by his actions and really acts like a royal jack ass on the phone. She told him to let her handle her patients and he should handle his. She moved Jason to a private facility so he could be watched where he still tried to kill himself again over night proving she was right and causing Dr. West to call and apologize for second guessing her actions with the teen. During Thanksgiving they have lunch at her parents and dinner at Blake’s since he is able to be home for a few days so she eats there that night and drops the kids off. Shortly after the holidays she gets a call from Dr. West to take her to Lunch to get to know her better. This is a bit awkward for her but she takes the offer. Lunch turns into, may I take you to dinner turns, into can I see you again for another dinner turns into, now they are dating. Which makes the kids especially Daphne her daughter upset. Although Sam the youngest doesn’t seem to be upset either way he is happy to see his mother happy and so is Zelda her live in housekeeper. Charles West likes Maxine a lot and seems to get along well enough with Zelda and Sam although he would like to have Maxine all to himself. Around Valentines Day they decide they will get married but not to tell the kids till June and have the wedding till August in her house in Southampton. From the time they tell the kids in June till the time they have the rehearsal dinner in August things seem to be slowly deteriorating with Charles and Maxine. Her two older children still have not warmed to him at all especially Daphne and she still does not want to go to the wedding. Maxine herself has no clue how to bring it all together as one cohesive unit but she is trying the best she can. Danielle Steel once again brings us a award winning book that deals with matters of the heart and everyday happenings with family and marriage. Things that we all would or should take into account in our everyday happenings. She really knows how to look at both sides of the heart so to speak. She is one of the brightest, talented authors I have had the privilege to review and will always be happy to do so.

Sisters by Danielle Steel

Sisters Sabrina, Tammy, Annie & Candy are happy each with their own lives Sabrina being a successful lawyer, Tammy a producer for a hit TV show in L.A., Annie living in Florence lives for art and to paint, and Sister Candy is and International model in Paris, New York and Tokyo and is well know to everyone in the supermodel industry as “The Candy”. The Sisters all take leave from their prospective jobs to go home to Connecticut to spend time with their parents for their annual Fourth of July party. Sister Annie and their Mom go to pick up a few forgotten items for the party and are involved in a tragic three vehicle accident when pipes from a truck in front of them fall off the truck and fly through the window striking the window and ejecting her mother from the car killing her on impact and severely injuring her leaving her blind. When authorities let them know the family is crushed that their mother and wife is gone and daughter& sister is severely injured. When it is time for Annie’s bandages to come off they let the doctor gently tell her the news all though she still was very upset and though her life was ending since her mother had dies and now she has lost her sight. One of her sisters brought up the idea of all of them living together till Annie can function on her own. At first Annie does not like the idea because she doesn’t think she’s ever going to be able to function independently Their father seems to be getting worse and worse over losing his wife until a person from the sisters past shows up to pay respects to the family of their mothers passing. They become kindred spirits and start seeing each other without the sisters knowing it. Once the sisters move in together some things start to be easier for each of them. Annie finally decides to start the school of the blind, and does well to acclimating to her new lifestyle. When Thanksgiving rolls around their father seems to be a bit happier than he was. The girls do notice a girl’s pair of tennis shoes sitting near the back door which alarms them a bit but they are waved off by their father saying it may be just one of the friends he had over lately. The girl’s lives have been turned upside down since the Fourth of July accident and they really don’t know what to expect next and they may not be ready for it either. This is another one of Danielle’s all time tug-at-your heart strings stories. She will never cease to amaze us with how well she can manipulate our feelings with each page. This is definitely be put with my ever growing Danielle Steel collection.

aluve'

Zollyanna

Bungalow 2

Tanya Harris is a part-time mother and writer but one does pay the bills her husband is a successful lawyer. But when she gets a call from her agent, Walt one day with an offer to write a screenplay by a famous Oscar-winning Hollywood producer her day is becomes anything but normal. She doesn’t know how to react or what to say to the once in a lifetime offer she knows she will have to talk it over with her husband and 3 kids, she just can’t make the decision of going to L.A. to work on a movie script without talking to them first. The girls Molly and Megan and son Jason are all in school and fixing to go off to College they need her, it would be selfish of her to go off and leave them for up to nine months to work on this movie while they are back home in Marin. She tells him to hold the producer off one more day so she can talk to her family. She thinks about it a bit and realizes that she could never leave her family especially her girls they mean too much to her and they need her especially with this last year of school coming up this is their senior year. She decides to tell her agent no and not discuss it with her husband Peter, the next morning when Peter sees her however, he sees straight through her cover-up and asks her if she is hiding something from her and to fess up and she tells him all. He is very surprised especially at the amount that they are going to pay her which would help pay for the kids college tuitions. He thinks she should go he knows this is one thing she has always wanted and thinks she should go for it. That he and the kids can make it for those few months until she gets back especially if she is coming home on weekends. She said she would think about it and they could talk about it over dinner that evening he said he would take her to a nice restaurant. She called her agent and put him off one more day he told her that the producer would be fine with it because he wanted her over all the others anyway. When they talked with the kids the next morning after dinner Jason and Molly were fine but Megan blew up thinking that her mother was leaving her and that she was being selfish and not thinking about the family at all. Peter convinced Tanya that it was just a typical teenager temper tantrum that the kids were not home during the week and when they got home they were gone with their friends they only really needed her when they were home on the weekends. Megan still doesn’t let up on her mother about her decision even till the day she leaves. When Tanya reaches L.A. she feels like she is in heaven. Everything she likes is in the bungalow down to her favorite color, chocolates and even her bathrobe, and shoe size as well. They had sent a questionnaire to Peter to make her feel at home while she worked on the movie script. On the days that she comes home things seem still do not to ease up between Megan and her mother at all. Things go down hill not only with Megan but with her and Peter after Thanksgiving Holidays and things get harder to patch up as the days go on while she works on the script. One person may not want to patch things up as much as another if you know what I mean.

Danielle Steel has given us another emotional attention getter in Bungalow 2. Ms. Steel never ceases to amaze with each of her books that I read I find a page turner that I am captivated with. The characters are filled with depth, heart, soul and each one you can really associate with one way or another. I know this one will be on my keeper shelf for years to come.

Aluve' my friends
Zollyanna